


What Is and Will Be

by Accidentallytechohazardous



Series: Apartmentsquad [1]
Category: Bleach
Genre: Alternate Universe - Human, M/M, Threesome - M/M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-21
Updated: 2014-01-21
Packaged: 2018-01-09 11:48:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,623
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1145609
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Accidentallytechohazardous/pseuds/Accidentallytechohazardous
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>You could say they’re complicated people. To tell their story isn’t something that can be done from point A to point B in a linear line. It twists and turns, falls to fragments, and putting the pieces together is how you see the whole picture.</p>
            </blockquote>





	What Is and Will Be

There’s a bulb that swings overhead. It rocks back and forth like the pendulum on a clock, tossing its light on the ground underneath in searchlight-spots against the stained cement.

The gloves on Izuru’s hands are tight, and the latex rubs against his skin in a way that is both pleasant and unpleasant. It catches on the creases on his knuckles, stretches almost translucent at the tips where the material is strained. His hands are longer than most, bonier too. Artist’s hands. Izuru’s mother always said he had the hands of an artist.The lightbulb swings forwards, throwing the face in the rickety office chair in front of Izuru into unattractively fluorescent clarity. The mouth is lolling open from when Izuru was digging around in there, coffee-yellowed teeth with a stain of blood smeared red like dirty bricks for good measure. The patient’s eyes are hazy and clouded with the effect of novocaine. That’s probably novocaine, anyways. Whatever. He’ll come to in a few minutes.

Izuru examines his prize clamped between stainless-steel tongs. A canine, which is notable seeing as Izuru doesn’t get many canines. People are rather attached to their canines, as it happens. It’s still got a bit of the gums attached to it at the root. Beautiful. Izuru sets in down in the metal tin on the cart where all his equipment is, and the rattle of bone against metal echoes noisily.

Izuru pulls his gloves off and examines his hands. A bit of blood had dribbled down his wrist between the gap of his gloves and his smock, and he wipes it off on his pants before remembering he’s wearing his nice pair of jeans.

The patient groans as he begins to regain full consciousness, but Izuru doesn’t really notice because at the same time his phone is ringing. Next to the tooth-tin his smartphone begins to vibrate excitedly while loudly demanding that one must “Shake ya money-maker like somebody ‘bout to pay ya’ yeah.”

Izuru pins it between his shoulder and his ear while he fishes out a wad of gauze and a moist towelette. He thinks of telling Renji that this isn’t the best time, but it would be a futile effort anyways because the world runs on Renji-time.

“Paging Dr. Kira, I have an urgent message to you from an esteemed mutual associate.”

“That’s a little formal just to say that Shuuhei told you to call.”

“Sorry.” Renji pauses a beat. “What are you wearing?”

Izuru wedges the gauze between his patient’s teeth. He’s forgotten what he’s wearing. He glances down to check. “A blood-stained smock made out of a disposable rain-poncho.”

He hears Renji snort into the phone. “Hot. Anyways, Shuuhei is tired and doesn’t feel like cooking. Can you pick up pizza or something on the way home?”

“Why don’t you cook?” Izuru rips the top off the packaging of the towelette and offers it to the man beginning to drowsily stir in the office chair.

“Heh.”

Izuru stares at the slate wall ahead and pretends that Renji can see the expression of utter disappointment on his face. It’s not like he can cook either, but at least he has a job- unofficial and underground it may be- instead of sitting at home and cluttering his boyfriends’ phone memory with 284 pictures of him in various states of undress from angles that by all means should be physically impossible to capture on a phone camera. Izuru looks at them very intently while he’s waiting for anesthesia to kick in. Shuuhei makes mortifying squeaky noises and gets yelled at for breaking cups.

“Fine. I’m finishing up my last appointment for the day. I’ll call in a place for pick-up when I’m finished.” Izuru concedes. Really, he should just consider adding the pizzeria’s number to his contacts.

“Did your guy pay upfront?”

Izuru pauses. He feels the crumpled wad of large bills in his pocket, just to check that its still there and still produces an intense feeling of satisfaction.“Yeah. Why?”

“So why don’t you just book it right now?”

Izuru opens his mouth to respond. Then thinks better and closes it. He hangs up and slips his phone into his pocket before undoing the ties on his smock/rain-poncho. He turns on his heel and leaves his groggy patient under the dim spotlight of the light-bulb. He takes the tooth in the metal tin with him. He’s gonna put it in the pizza and he won’t even care. He hopes Renji finds it first and screams like a little girl, oh yes he does.

 

—-

All three would agree that it wasn’t the perfect relationship. They’re not sure whether they’d collectively go so far as to say it’s “dysfunctional”, per-say. Certainly, it takes a lot of work. It takes a lot more work than any of them thought they’d ever put into a relationship. That was a surprise.

Maybe thats what helps, that the three of them, deep down, are selfish people. It was just very convenient that three different people decided that what they really wanted was each other.

 

—-

A List Of Shuuhei’s Favorite Things:

-Snow flurries when the flakes clump together mid-descent, becoming thicker and heavier and make the rest of the world feel like it was shrunken a bit.

-When he sees someone looking kind of down at the bar and he gets to whip out his lighter to light their cigarette and wear the Understanding Bartender expression he practiced in the bathroom mirror before his shift.

-When Renji tries to text him something lewd and accidentally says something sweet. Something about wanting to trace the lines of Shuuhei’s face with his fingertips or to feel Shuuhei’s breath on the back of his neck like a collar or how beautifully Shuuhei’s body fits against Izuru’s. They are often followed by hastily written blurbs of “ajahdjJDFJDSKF NEVREMIND.” and Renji doesn’t text for the rest of the night but Shuuhei keeps pulling his phone out to look at that message and feel pleased.

-The way Izuru smells after washing up after work. Once he’s rinsed the stench of harsh chemicals and the sour tang of blood, and instead smells faintly like the scent of his lemony shampoo. He changes into fresh clothes, even though if he had his way he would never bother with such a trivial hassle like that, because he knows Shuuhei likes the bitter smell of laundry detergent. It feels safe and shiny like when Izuru forgets to be morose and actually smiles, a real, true smile, and every time it feels like a fresh breath of something blinding and brilliant.

-Iconic horror movies. He likes the rush of adrenaline that spikes between when everything in the plot is fine and when it all starts to go terribly, shockingly wrong. He thinks about how the characters never recognize this for themselves, are unable to see their own impending demise.

Maybe that should ring a little closer to home. Like, if he were Donnie Darko or Veronica Sawyer or Carrie White (Or any of the other characters in Carrie) maybe the fact that he’s dating one guy with a very limited understanding of social cues and one guy who pulls out people’s teeth for a living and both these guys are dating each other is a sign that he should perhaps re evaluate the direction is life is moving in.

But Shuuhei’s life isn’t a cult-classic. Izuru and Renji aren’t the destructive maniacs certain neighborhood watch-people seem to think they are. And every time there’s a fight, every time Shuuhei feels that panic surging through his body like he’s teetering on the edge of a canyon and thinks “Oh God, this is the end. One of them is going to leave and he won’t come back and its going to all fall apart.” Every time they almost self-destruct, Shuuhei digs his heels into the edge of the cliff and hauls them back. And it works, somehow, and Shuuhei feels like the hero of his own life’s movie because he saved what mattered most to him and he doesn’t even care if it sounds sappy.

 

—-

 

Renji had a girlfriend at the time Shuuhei and Izuru started dating, because goddamn if he was gonna be the third wheel all his life!

She was beautiful and tough, she used crass language so creatively he couldn’t help but laugh at some of the insults she invented even when they were directed at him. His friends liked her a lot too. They all did. Except, it seemed, for Izuru.

Renji took his girlfriend to meet up with Izuru and Shuuhei in a bar once time. (He refused to call it a double-date.) She and Shuuhei got along swimmingly- turns out she also was a musician, and for Renji’s money she was just as terrible at it. They were at the table for less than ten minutes before Shuuhei challenged her to a game of darts and off they went.

And Renji sat with Izuru at the table and Izuru sipped at his drink and kept giving Renji these looks. Just- these fucking looks, like a “Please recognize the sense of superiority I feel right now over you” look.

“What is it?” Renji finally gave in, trying and failing not to sound defensive.

“She’s very nice.” Izuru said tersely, in that clipped tone of voice he reserves for when he knows he’s about to be mean but can’t hold himself back. It’s a tone that simply rings of control issues.

“…But?”

Izuru’s eyes slid over to Renji. “Is she what you really want? Like, what you actually need to be happy? Or maybe you’re just being stupid again.”

“Hey, do you think that maybe for once in your life,” Renji told him, “You could act like a normal human being? Just, like- be happy for me. Can you do that?”

Izuru set his shoulders back and turned his head to look at Renji from a different angle, like that would give him some key for how to address his true thoughts. “Her hair.”

“You don’t like her hair?”

“It’s short and dark.”

“So?”

“She’s wearing a lot of jewelry.”

“It looks nice.”

“She has tattoos…”

“Who cares about that? Plenty of people have tattoos! I have tattoos, Shuuhei has-”

And then Renji shut up very quickly. He felt something like blood rushing to his head, the world around him doing spins and flips, purposely twirling around just to disorient him and piss him off.

Of course- of fucking course Izuru had to be the asshole and drop that on him. And it was only natural that the more Renji thought about it, the more he realized that Izuru had only realized half of the problem.

Renji’s girlfriend also had bright blue eyes. She had long, bony fingers, like an artist’s.

 

—-

 

The issue is that everything is built for either two people or four people, not the number in-between. There’s not a whole lot of free space, which is new for Izuru, who was one of those typical lonely only-children who play the role of the illusioned, spoiled product of an artificial society in existential books. It feels like he, Renji and Shuuhei practically trip over each other at every opportunity.

Izuru bought them a twin-sized bed, which ended up being a mistake. He really should have just splurged on the queen size, but he has a feeling that doing that might provoke more than a few unnecessary jokes from certain idiot boyfriends who have no self-control.

Izuru ends up sandwiched between the other two, because if he sleeps on the edge he’s bound to get pushed off somehow. Shuuhei gets one end, draping his arm and leg over the side because he gets too hot over the covers and also is somehow immune to the childhood fear of getting snatched by the monster under the bed, and Renji gets the other side because he likes being little spoon.

Izuru wears Shuuhei’s boxers as pajamas. He likes the black ones with the skulls on it. Really, its a shame for Shuuhei that he and Izuru have similar tastes, because Izuru will steal everything of Shuuhei’s that he likes without fail. He usually leaves Renji’s stuff alone, because Renji is a bitch about shit like that and assumes Izuru is doing it ironically to tease him. He did manage to snag one of Renji’s hoodies, though. It’s got the logo of one of Renji’s favorite comic book characters, and the sleeves are long enough to go past his fingertips. All-in-all the whole outfit goes together very nicely with his “GAYS FOR SATAN” hat. Renji won’t let him outside in that outfit.

That only makes Izuru want to wear it more. He’s almost gotten there. He made it to the doorway before Renji tackled him to the floor and demanded that he at least put some pants on over Shuuhei’s stolen boxers. It was a huge mistake to let Renji start watching Project Runway and Izuru will never forgive Rangiku for letting it happen. On the other hand he made Shuuhei throw out that awful fishnet shirt so Izuru can’t say its all bad.

—-

 

A Small List of Things Shuuhei Has Received From His Boyfriends Over The Years:

-A bug encased in a block of ice that Izuru gave him when he was eight because he thought it was cool. Shuuhei was a year older and refused to touch it. Looking back on it, it was really sweet but Shuuhei still won’t let Izuru keep bugs in the house. No, not even an ant farm. No, certainly not a spider, he doesn’t care that they’re technically not bugs. Izuru, stop asking.

-An action figure Renji gave him for his 13th birthday. Shuuhei wasn’t really into comic books, but he knew Renji was. What he didn’t realize was that Renji had a crush on this particular superhero character, which put a whole new spin on the fact that he gave it to Shuuhei. Shuuhei found it years upon years later and put it on the mantelpiece. Renji got embarrassed and tried to hide it but Izuru heard the story and recovered it again and put it on top of the fridge. A strange on-going game of hide-and-seek evolved from there. Last Shuuhei checked it was in the pantry, heroically gesturing to the jar of trail-mix.

-A belt that Izuru bought him for their second anniversary, because Izuru doesn’t realize that a belt is a gift that you get from your aunt or something and not your boyfriend.

-A vibrating dildo Izuru bought him that same year for Christmas as an act of overcompensation when Shuuhei made the mistake of being honest about the belt.

-Those photos Renji let Shuuhei take for when he had to go on a weekend trip. Those photos that had material one could say passed the border of “risque”. Those photos that may or may not have included a mini-skirt. Those photos that Shuuhei maybe should have kept in a safer and more private place than his wallet.

-The loogie that Renji hawked into his coffee cup when he wasn’t looking when he found out that Shuuhei lost the pictures and had no idea where they were, but they’re probably still in the apartment complex somewhere. Or on a plane five hundred miles away. Hard to say.

-A stranger’s tooth from Izuru. He’s not sure why.

-A portrait from both Renji and Izuru for Valentine’s Day, which was hilarious because they had both declared they hated the entire holiday and all it stood for. It was a snapshot from their previous vacation together, which happens to be Shuuhei’s favorite. They were at a beach, and made Izuru wear a big sunhat because his cheeks and nose were getting horribly burnt. Izuru was trying hard not to smile and failing, peeking at the camera from underneath the floppy brim. Renji was next to him, sprinkled in freckles like a rambunctious 12-year-old boy in an old-timey movie, for once not pulling a face at the camera because he was busy smirking at Shuuhei, who was over on Izuru’s other side and wearing too much sunscreen on his nose. The portrait was presented in a simple wooden frame and with two bottles of wine that they collectively finished by the next morning.

 

—-

 

Maybe Renji could have done it. Maybe he could have lived without them, could have lived with this girl or some other person out there. But he really doesn’t feel like he had much of a choice in the matter to begin with.

Because Renji never loved his girlfriend, but perhaps one day he could have. He loved things about her. He loved the way her mouth tilted at the corners when she smiled. He loved the way she brushed her hair out of her eyes. And if Izuru also tilted the corner of his mouth when he smiled and Shuuhei also brushed his hair out of his eyes in the same way then, well, who really needed to know that?

As long as Izuru kept his big fat mouth shut, it could still be Renji’s own dirty little secret. A private little piece of shame he could sink his teeth into, so long as it chased away the strange sense of starvation that appeared whenever he saw Izuru and Shuuhei holding hands, their fingers interlocked like the clasps of a padlock. Sometimes it was even worth the guilt just to have someone lying in bed next to him and not having to worry about who he was kind of wishing it was. That when he squeezed her hand by the knobby knuckles it was her hand he was trying to feel, and when he tucked her head under his chin it was her dark hair that he imagined was tickling his neck.

Meanwhile, Renji’s girlfriend had a secret of her own, and that secret had a problem. And that problem was being dead.

Renji turned the picture over in his hands. It was glossy, only a little bit faded, but dog-eared on all four corners. It had a bit of lint stuck on the back from the inside of her coat pocket where she’d been keeping it.

“My, uh-” She swallowed and looked away guiltily. She folded her arms inside her jacket. Renji didn’t like how petite it made her look, and then instantly felt guilty for thinking that. “My ex-fiance.”

In the picture, Renji’s girlfriend is standing next to a guy and she’s smiling. A real, full, toothy smile and not the tight-lipped, tilted corner smile that he liked.

He didn’t know what to say. He never does in situations like these. If it were him, he’d hate having a hollow apology thrown his way. He wanted to say sorry anyways. Instead he clears his throat. “What happened?”

“An accident.” She said, in a tone just a big beyond control squeezed through gritted teeth. “A hit-and run. But it’s okay- I’m okay. I got over it. Everything’s in the past now.”

Well, obviously not. Renji gave her back the picture and she put in back in her jacket pocket.

In the picture, her fiance had a sharp jaw, broad shoulders, and long hair. It goes without saying that Renji has all of these things as well. And the fact that this sat in a corner of Renji’s mind like a tack on a map, a constant reminder that neither of them would ever be able to look at each other and see reality, that it was almost like Renji wasn’t even there at all, makes him realize that he always knew this wasn’t going to work. That he wasn’t going to work. Not like this.

When they broke up, they both screamed quite a lot. He’s not sure who officially broke it off but he’s pretty sure it wasn’t him, and this would have made him yell a lot more if not for the fact that he kept getting distracted by the fact that when she cried she looked almost exactly like Izuru.

Some time after he stormed out of his ex-girlfriends car, Renji got a little drunk and stumbled into Shuuhei and Izuru’s apartment. Memories of the night after that get a bit hazy, but he remembered that was the night he learned that Shuuhei always kept beer and ice cream in the freezer. Two weeks later he learned that one of them had slipped a spare key to their apartment in his pocket. Three months later he learned how to tell Izuru and Shuuhei apart by the taste of their lips alone, and by the time he came to memorize those tastes like stamps on his brain the ache of starvation inside him had ebbed away so slowly.

 

—-

 

They’re not faultless people, that should go without saying. And they are oh-so careless with how much they love. They really can’t control themselves. By now, any one of them has the means to turn the others’ lives into a living hell, to twist them and poison them like rot spreading from one branch through a whole tree.

But they won’t. And thats how they know. When the idea of someone hurting is worse than the idea of being hurt. When the thought of losing this closeness, this sense of being one of three, their own personal holy trinity, petrifies them more than thoughts of time and death and the edge of space. They know because of daily pleasantries and past heartbreaks and grocery lists of memories. They don’t need each other like a person needs to feel love, but rather like how a person needs a heart to be able to feel in the first place.


End file.
